MetroRiders.Org

I was out of the country for a few weeks and returned home via Reagan Nat'l Airport at around 10:30 PM on July 4th. I hadn't been aware of the changes on the rail for that day, but the "masks" (temporary rail system maps) filled me in well enough.

But fwiw, I witnessed 3 snafus - or at least if not snafus, areas for improvement....

I had been traveling for all of the previous 24 hours and I confess I wasn't in a good mood. So the 20 or 25 minute stop on the blue line south of Arlington Cemetery (headed toward Rosslyn) was pretty annoying for me. (Snafu #1)

But I also pitied the poor people who were on the lower level of the Rosslyn station trying to be patient waiting for a blue line train south - and on this day, all of those trains were on the UPPER level. There was a Metro employee on the upper level announcing that the arriving blue line trains (from the south) were headed back south. But this went un-heard on the lower level. (Snafu #2) I directed a FEW people upstairs, but my orange line train to Vienna was there and I needed to go. I saw an employee coming down to the lower level just as my train was leaving Rosslyn, so maybe this "snafu" only lasted a few minutes - I don't know.

Meanwhile, there were overhead announcement to the station managers telling them to remove the "masks" if they haven't already done so. This was about 11:30pm. Given that there were people in the system still unaware of the special rail changes (see above), I kindly submit these instructions to the station managers were premature. (Snafu #3)

Thanks for listening.